Just five days before the women’s giant slalom, Mikaela Shiffrin faced a tough blow! On February 10, in the very first alpine event of the Games, she and her teammate Breezy Johnson raced in the women’s team combined event. Johnson gave her best, but Shiffrin struggled and finished 15th. With that, the U.S team ended up fourth, missing out on a medal. Still, hopes were that Shiffrin could make a comeback in the giant slalom, but now it seems those hopes might be in vain.

On February 15, Mikaela Shiffrin went down the course in the women’s giant slalom, an event where her slalom skills could have turned pressure into a medal. She gave clean and controlled runs, but her speed wasn’t enough to challenge the top skiers. As she finished in 11th place with a time of 2:14.42, while Italy’s Federica Brignone took gold at 2:13.50, and Sweden’s Sara Hector and Thea Louise Stjernesund tied for silver.

In her first run, Shiffrin skied very well, posting 1:04.25, just 0.28 seconds off the early leaders. After all 76 racers completed their first attempt, she stood seventh, 1.02 behind Brignone. And then, the second run began smoothly, but she could not generate the speed needed in the latter half of the course. She crossed 0.25 behind the in-race leader at the time, sitting seventh temporarily.

With that said, Mikaela Shiffrin once again missed out on an Olympic medal.

However, it marked another race without a medal, and this one carried extra weight. Giant slalom was the event where Shiffrin won Olympic gold in 2018. This time, she could not defend that title.

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Interestingly, before the race, Shiffrin had shared an emotional message on social media. Looking back on her brutal crash in Killington, Vermont, in 2024, where she punctured her abdomen, she wrote that she felt an “overwhelming sense of gratitude” just to be competing in Milan. She admitted, “I’m proud of how far I’ve come. A little over a year ago, following my crash and injury in Killington…cont.”

That perspective made her presence at the start gate meaningful, even if the result did not follow. But for Team USA, it has been a challenging stretch, especially after the disappointment surrounding Lindsey Vonn earlier in the Games. Yet Shiffrin’s story in Milan is not finished.

Mikaela Shiffrin’s last chance to strike gold in Milan

Well, Mikaela Shiffrin qualified for three alpine skiing events at the 2026 Winter Olympics. The first two, the women’s team combined and the women’s giant slalom, did not bring a medal. But one event still remains. The women’s slalom on February 18 is her final opportunity, and on paper, it is her strongest shot.

The reason is simple. No one has been better in slalom this season.

In the 2025 to 2026 World Cup campaign, Shiffrin won seven of the eight slalom races before the Olympics. She did not just win. But she won by margins that separated her clearly from the rest of the field.

Interestingly, she also secured her ninth slalom Crystal Globe and it confirmed her as the season champion in the discipline. That makes her the first skier, man or woman to win nine titles in a single discipline.

Also, just before the Olympics, she won the final World Cup slalom in Spindleruv Mlyn by 1.67 seconds. And if that wasn’t enough look at her career numbers.

Shiffrin has 71 World Cup slalom victories – that’s  the most ever in the discipline.

So yes, despite missing the podium in her first two events in Milan, Shiffrin can still win a medal in 2026.